Harry Potter and the Prince of Slytherin

Chapter 1: The Lessons of Summer

1 July 1992

Harry Potter stared at the telephone on his work desk with a vague distrust. Although technically "Muggle-raised," his time spent with the Dursleys had left him ill-equipped to deal with many aspects of Muggle existence. In this instance, while he (unlike most Purebloods) knew what a telephone was, he had never actually used one in his entire life, and he was now oddly nervous as a result. However, his nervousness was outweighed by his frustration over the fact that not one of his friends had owled him any letters so far, not even to respond to those he'd sent out. It was ... annoying. Finally, the boy took a deep breath and dialed the number in front of him, and after a few rings, a female voice answered.

"Granger residence."

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Granger. My name is Harry Potter, and I'm a school mate of Hermione. By any chance is she available?"

"Harry Potter? You were the young man at the station, weren't you?" For a second, Harry thought the woman's voice seemed to register disapproval. Then, he shook his head. He was just imagining things. "Just a moment," she said. Harry could hear Hermione's mother move away from the phone and then call out to her daughter. Seconds later, there was the sound of running feet and then a squeal that almost made Harry drop the receiver.

"HARRY POTTER! Where have you been?! We've all been worried sick about you!"

Harry was surprised by the unexpected outburst. "You have? And who's 'we'?"

"Neville, Blaise and myself. Oh, and Theo, though I only hear from him second-hand through Blaise. Apparently, he's very paranoid about sending owls to and from Malfoy Manor. Understandable I suppose. But anyway, we've all been sending you owl posts for two weeks now and haven't heard anything from you. Blaise has been threatening to send Gunther to kick in the Dursleys' door and rescue you." She paused. "You didn't actually need rescuing, did you? I'll never hear the end of it if you did and I talked Blaise out of saving you in some dramatic fashion."

Harry laughed. "No, I haven't needed saving. It's just been boring and lonely here. It's rather odd though because I've been sending owls out to you lot as well and never heard back from anyone. Posts to and from my solicitors get through fine, but nothing from any fellow students I've written to. Dumbledore was supposed to have put up some wards here when I was first dropped off. Maybe he included a post owl ward or some such nonsense. Anyway, I'll have Hestia and Artie look into it now that I know that it's an actual thing and not everyone just ignoring me." He laughed at that. "In the meantime, could you owl Blaise and Neville and let them know I'm okay and it's just an issue with owl delivery?"

"Of course," Hermione replied. "Though Neville is out of country at the moment. He and Lady Augusta are in the Amazonian jungle on an expedition to find some rare plant specimens. They won't be back until the 15th, and I doubt an owl could find him before then. Anyway, other than lack of communication, how has your summer been?"

"Not bad. I've finished my homework. I have my own TV for the first time in my life, but there never seems to be anything good on so I don't know that I missed much. I don't have to cook for anyone but myself, although I'm getting a bit tired of cold sandwiches and Ramen noodles cooked in a microwave. On the bright side, I start tutoring tomorrow. I'm a bit excited about that."

"Tutoring? But we can't use our wands during the summer, can we?" Hermione asked.

"Well, as is usually the case, there are loopholes put in place for the benefit of the rich and well-connected that are big enough to drive a lorry through them. There's a license you can apply for from the Ministry that lets you use your wand over the summer for limited times provided you're supervised by an adult who gets Ministry approval. My solicitors got it set up for me. They don't mention it at Hogwarts because it's bloody expensive, and I guess they don't want the less wealthy parents to complain about the inherent unfairness of it all. I wrote you all about it in one of those owl posts that disappeared into the netherworld or whatever."